Manipulated
by richard the pedantic
Summary: Set shortly after the first film, sort of. Donnie and Gretchen find that they must work with Frank to prevent another tangent universe from causing the end of existence. Chapeter 15 is up.
1. Artifact

**Greetings all. This story won't make a hell of a lot of sense unless you read the philosophy of time travel on the DVD. Even then it might not make much sense. Much like the film itself. Oh well.**

**Also, for later reference, I know that Gretchen was alive and living at the end of the film. Her place in the story therefore may initially seem inplausible, as may Donnie's actually. Anyway, my point is that their presences shall all be explained soon enough.**

**Characters from the film will be in this story, although not in chapter one.**

**One last thing, if at any point it seems that this is getting too much like the film itself, please let me know.**

* * *

**Manipulated**

**By Richard Paul**

**Chapter 1: Artifact**

_Metal is the transitional element for the construction of Artifact Vessels. _– From the philosophy of time travel

A loud, high pitched whine sounded in the far corner of Kelly Wyle's room at roughly the same time as the early morning's sunshine fought it's way through the semi-transparent black curtains.

Kelly rolled onto her side in an attempt to shield her eyes from the intrusion of natural light. Her mind refused to return to the warm, comforting state of sleep however, and she groaned with fatigue and exasperation as she realised that she'd have to get up.

"Kel!" Boomed the voice of her father from the room next to hers, "Turn that fucking thing off!"

"Alright!" She shot back at the wall from which the sound had originated; her voice was a fusion of anger and fatigue.

She pushed the quilt away from her and switched off the shrieking alarm before she received another shout from her father or someone barging into her room and shutting the machine off for her.

It was a cold morning. Through her window, which was obscured by the curtain, she could see far more areas of grey then of blue. The cold was also beginning to register in her mind now, and standing amongst the cold air in nothing but her underwear suddenly seemed unappealing.

Hurriedly, she pulled a grey shirt and a pair of surprisingly warm black trousers from her wardrobe, with these items of clothing in hand; she rushed for the shower before anyone else could get there before her.

* * *

Roughly fifteen minutes later, she was dressed, washed, cold and starving. She made her way down the stairs quickly and advanced into the kitchen where she found Jennifer Wyle, her mother, sitting at the kitchen table, staring with frustrated eyes at the screen of her laptop computer.

"Morning." She said upon seeing her daughter, "I'm afraid you'll have to sort yourself out for breakfast this morning. There's some leftover chicken in the fridge I think."

Her eyes fell back to the computer screen. Kelly nodded and moved towards the fridge. Pulling out the corpse of last night's dinner, she placed it upon a counter and started to pick what meat she could find from it. After a few minutes, she had formed a marmite coated chicken sandwich.

She took an empty space at the table and began to devour her meal. The bread and cold meat didn't do much to calm her stomach, and she soon went in search of other things that she could eat.

"How's school going?" Jennifer asked, her mind still focused on her work.

"Fine." Kelly responded whilst scouring through a cupboard.

"Are you keeping up with your homework deadlines?"

"Yes."

Jennifer looked up from her computer.

"Are you going to respond with anything other then one word answers?"

"No."

Jennifer remained silent for a while after that, feeling the usual combination of light concern and irritation that typically followed her daughter's vagueness. She seemed to become more and more distant from her with each passing day. Whenever she returned from high school she would vanish to her room and stay there for most of the night.

_She's just growing up; _an annoying part of her brain repeated once more, _Stop worrying._

She shrugged and returned to her work.

Kelly was taking a bite out of a mars bar she had found hidden behind a box of tea bags in the cupboard when she cast her eyes to the clock.

"Shit!" She half shouted, almost choking in the process. She then hastily made her way upstairs, pulled her school bag from the floor of her bedroom and charged back downstairs again.

"See you tonight." She half-shouted as she moved through the door.

"Bye." Jennifer replied, mainly to herself seeing as Kelly was already long gone, charging up the street towards the bus stop where presumably, an absence of people would inform her that the bus had been and gone.

* * *

Contrary to her mother's expectation, (what was becoming something of a tradition), Kelly made it to the bus stop on time. She soon found herself moving down a road that was marked with numerous fallen leaves. Most of which had been swept by the wind to the side of the left side of the road or the nearby pavement.

"I mean, who the fuck do they think they are. It was meant to be my day off. My _fucking _day off. And then all of a sudden they decide that they don't want me to have some time away from work and I find a message on my phone, demanding that I drop whatever I'm doing and waste more of my life toiling away for them. And I can't even say..."

Kelly resisted the urge to roll her eyes as she listened to her friend Elena Harrison unburden her soul. She was, in Kelly's opinion, the apex of paranoia. Whenever someone at school accidentally walked into her, Elena was certain it had been deliberate, and then she was certain that the apology she typically received was forced. Then she'd check her pockets five times to make sure that her wallet; keys and phone were still there.

"Are you listening?" Elena asked suddenly.

"Not really."

"Thanks, great fucking help you are."

"Cramming the word fuck into every sentence isn't going to scare me if that's what you're thinking? And what do you want me to do anyway? Go back in time and demand that the evil 'they' of whom you speak give you the day off you missed. Do you even know who 'they' are?"

Elena was silent for a few moments; she was frequently finding herself being outwitted by Kelly who would normally find some flaw in her arguments or point out that she was ranting. Every single time this happened, she _knew_ that Kelly was just trying to make her sound like an idiot in front of everyone else.

She opened her mouth to say bitch but immediately abandoned the idea. IF she did she'd just receive another insufferably calm explanation about how swearing in times of stress just showed a lack of wit. Kelly always seemed to be un-phased by everything.

The next few moments passed in silence. Then Elena decided that she had been angry at Kelly long enough and went on to describe how her sister kept stealing money from her wallet.

* * *

The first thing that Kelly noticed upon leaving the bus was a smear of something white on the grass near the entrance to the school. Telling Elena that she'd catch up with her in a few minutes, she walked over to where the patch of white, expecting to see a discarded crisp packet or something equally nondescript. The only reason that she was going to investigate was so that she'd have a handful of seconds shaved off of the seemingly endless school day.

To her surprise, what she found was a car's registration plate. Or more accurately, part of one. The chunk of metal was charred at one end and seemed to have partially melted, and roughly a quarter of it was nowhere to be seen. The charred end was cool however, suggesting that it had been laying on the grass for quite a while. She could make out the letters F and N, and two fours. Another character was too badly distorted by whatever had caused the plate to melt to be recognisable. The rest were missing.

Another high pitched whine, not unlike that of her alarm clock, told her that school had officially started. Something within Kelly told her that this find was too important not to keep with her. Normally, she would have left the metal oddity where it lay, but today for some reason, she couldn't.

She opened her bag and hastily placed the registration plate inside, and then pushed herself off of the floor and hurried into the high school.

**To be continued.**


	2. Everybody dies alone and then

**Thanks to CaptainlonestarUSA and meichan-24 for reviewing. I get the feeling that there's something else i should say but i can't think of it.**

**Chapter 2: Everybody dies alone; and then...**

_I hope that when the world comes to an end, I can breathe a sigh or relief, because there will be so much to look forward to. _– Donnie Darko

Donnie flailed his limbs at the water around him in an attempt to propel himself to a surface that presumably lied somewhere above him. He soon found he was not ascending however; his attempts to propel himself weren't being rewarded with even a single milometer.

He kept his mouth shut tightly, clinging to what oxygen he had left and resisting the urge to try for more, the result of which would be water pouring down in throat and into his lungs. Then again, why not? He couldn't move, he couldn't breathe.

He didn't need to breathe.

That was the first thing Donnie realised when his mouth, against his will, opened. Water poured in, but he felt nothing. There wasn't any discomfort in his lungs; there was only confusion and fear.

Survival instincts began to take a back seat to questions. The first being 'where was he'. All he could see around him was water, and a bright white light that seemed to be coming from somewhere above him. Donnie couldn't make out exactly where the light was coming from.

It looked familiar.

Memory began to break through Donnie's confusion. He remembered Gretchen, her neck broken in half by a speeding car that seemed to envelop her. He remembered the engine that had fallen through his roof as he laughed inanely beside it. He remembered the wooden spike that had punched its way through his chest.

Almost instinctively, Donnie's eyes and hands flew to his chest, inspecting it for damage. There was nothing there, not even skin. The area around the wound seemed to have vanished completely. Donnie's shirt had twisted over the exposed innards and back out again, as if it had taken up the role that his skin once did.

"I'm dead." The words didn't sound like they had come from him, but it was clearly his voice, and it had been what he was thinking.

Shock filled him at this discovery. In one instant, his own hand had snatched his existence from him. He had wanted to die, he remembered that. After Frank had killed Gretchen, all he could think of was something she'd told him, about going back in time and changing all the bad things in your life to good. He knew that if he brought the engine back with him, the world would be safe, Gretchen would be OK, and he would be dead. No one would get hurt because of him again. Ever.

He didn't remember dying. For a long moment, all he could focus on was the pain of impalement via a large wooden spike. It seemed like it would never end, then the next moment, he found himself here. Struggling against the water.

"I've been waiting for you."

Donnie jumped at the sound of the voice. A corner of his brain had been expecting this, but fresh shock still came to him, as well as anger. He hadn't forgotten about what Frank had done.

"Aren't you going to say hello?"

Donnie almost snarled at the watery emptiness. He couldn't tell where the voice was coming from. There were no distorted figures visible anywhere.

"Where are you?" His voice was virtually a hiss; again, it didn't seem to have come from him.

"I've brought a friend."

That time, Donnie could hear where the voice had come from. He swung his body around; the water maintained its hold on him and made the movement infuriatingly difficult.

Frank stood a few meters in front of him; he was somehow perfectly visible despite the water between them. He was still wearing the bunny suit and mask. The grin on the mask seemed to reflect the amusement that Donnie was certain Frank was feeling at the confusion and fear of the stupid human that had stumbled into his lair.

He searched his pocket for the gun. He didn't stop to think that it had failed to do away with him the first time. The gun wasn't there. It didn't much matter to Donnie anyway once he noticed the second figure.

Gretchen stared at him, her eyes a mesh of disbelief and what could only be joy. Frank's hand, or paw, rested gently on her shoulder.

Donnie's anger vanished. For a few moments, it was all he could do to stare at Gretchen with similar disbelief to her own. He barely even noticed as the force keeping him in place vanished. A smile found its way onto his face as he moved towards Gretchen, who was in turn moving towards him.

He threw his arms around her and felt the tightening of her arms around his ribs. For the moment, he no longer cared about anything, not that he was dead, not Frank, not where he was, all that mattered was that Gretchen was all right, and with him.

"I thought you'd never get here." This sentence was stuttered, due to the fact that roughly halfway through it, Gretchen realised that it might sound offensive or uncaring.

"Why are you here?" Donnie asked, not at all offended, "I went back, I died when the plane engine crashed through my roof, you shouldn't have met me. You should be alive."

"She is."

Donnie's head moved to face Frank's, and he released Gretchen from his grasp. He was no longer sure whether he should be trying to kill him or in fact should be thanking him.

"What?" He asked after a few moments.

"Didn't you read this?"

Frank turned to stare at Donnie's left hand. Donnie looked down and found within it a small book. He held the front cover up to him.

_The Philosophy of Time Travel, by Roberta Sparrow._

Donnie was silent for a long moment as he flicked through pages, trying to associate seemingly relevant happenings from his final weeks to the words of the book. The answer came on chapter eight.

_'If a person dies within the tangent dimension...'_ His thoughts trailed off as he remembered the car rolling over Gretchen's body, snapping her neck in the process.

"But. But you said," Donnie paused to try and form the correct words, "you said she was alive."

"Here and there." Frank responded.

Gretchen extended a hand and placed it upon Donnie's shoulder.

"Frank explained it to me," She said softly, her eyes turning momentarily to Frank's form and revealing a small amount of nervousness, "I died there, so now I'm here. But because you went back, I'm still alive there as well."

"How is that possible?"

"Does it matter?" She asked, pulling his face closer to hers with her other hand.

Like his anger, Donnie's confusion left him as he and Gretchen kissed. Whilst it lasted, he felt an almost inexplicable sense of relief. It was greater then what he had felt as he realised he had saved the world and that his pain was about to end, it was greater then finding Gretchen again. He knew now that all he had to do was done. He could finally breathe the sigh of relief that he had explained to Roberta Sparrow. He knew, that he and everything else would be all right, from now until the end of time, if such a thing existed.

"No it won't." Frank said suddenly.

**To be continued.**


	3. Surrounding Silence

**Thanks once more to all reviewers, I'll include replies in later chapters but I won't be replying that often. I once tried replying to reviews in every chapter of one fic once, and thinking up things to say often took as long as writing the chapter.**

**Also just so you know, the story, (well chapters like this one at least,) are set in the present day as opposed to 1989.**

**Chapter 3: Surrounding Silence**

_If an Artifact occurs, the Living will retrieve it with great interest and curiosity. – From the Philosophy of Time Travel._

"What the hell were you thinking?"

Kelly opened her mouth to respond to Seachnall, but was unable to get a word out.

"You can't just take souvenirs from a fucking crash site. It..."

"That's just it." Kelly interrupted, "There wasn't a crash site. There's no charred wreckage outside the school, there was no mention of this on local news, and no one's said anything about it. There's just this charred piece of metal, which I found on the grass.

Seachnall Kerr took another look at the singed registration plate that laid on the grass between him and Kelly. At the start of lunch, she had pulled him away from the lunch queue because as she said, 'there was something important that she needed to show him'. She had then dragged him to the furthermost corner of the school, to a cold, wet patch of grass next to a collection of pine trees. Then she proceeded to show him the interesting chunk of aluminium that she had found on the grass that morning.

At first, his reaction had been one of anger and slight confusion. He had been denied lunch and had had to endure the insufferable suggestive jeers and hoots from Jack and Kyle that came as a result of Kelly dragging him off into seclusion. Then he found this whole thing was about something as small as a registration plate. After the initial frustration had passed, the questions regarding Kelly's grasp of common sense came to him.

Now, after realising that she was right about the silence surrounding this find, his curiosity grew. Casting his mind back to the start of school, he remembered seeing nothing vaguely resembling a car wreck, nor had anyone said anything about one. Normally anything interesting that happened in the area, especially that close to the school; was awarded at least a few minutes of discussion amongst students.

Kelly watched as the realisation, and subsequent confusion appeared in Seachnall's facial expression. With one finger he began to trace the edges of the registration plate, as if touching it could somehow reveal whatever secrets it held.

She had chosen to tell him as opposed to Elena or Callie as she knew he'd be the most likely to keep quiet about it. Anyone else would have been certain to spread the tale of the mystery registration plate, before long, a teacher would find out, or a parent or someone who had the power to take it out of her hands.

That couldn't happen, there was something about this chunk of metal that surpassed mild curiosity. She couldn't explain it, and a strange part of her felt as if she didn't need to, but she did know that she let it leave her side.

Seachnall's head tilted upwards so that it was facing hers.

"What do you think happened?" He asked; his voice made quiet and slower by his confusion.

"I don't know." Kelly replied, "It, doesn't make sense."

"If there was a crash," he said, his eyes moving to the plate once more, "they might have already moved the wreckage, if it happened late at night maybe? Around midnight?"

"What would a car be doing here at midnight?"

"Who can say, but it's only thing I can think of."

"We still would have heard something, you know how it is here. The most interesting thing that happens is the monthly thunderstorm. Gossipers would have pounced upon this."

"I wouldn't call a lack of gossip proof that this thing just appeared out of nowhere."

"But still, you have to admit it's strange."

"Hmm," Seachnall paused for a few moments, apparently considering the subject before finally pushing himself to his feet.

"Come with me." He said.

"Where are you going?" She asked, pushing the plate back into her bag as she did so.

He was already making his way back down the field however; Kelly pulled her bag from the floor and took of after him.

"Where are you going?" She repeated, louder this time.

"The local newspaper has a website right?"

"Right." Kelly said, relief emerging within her. She half expected him to say he was going to politely ask a teacher whether there had been a car crash recently and then explain in depth why he had asked. In other words, to bring the registration plate out into the open.

"Well then, if there was a car crash here then the story will be on their website won't it?"

"And if it isn't?"

Seachnall pushed breath out through his teeth as he considered this thought. It seemed possibly, albeit unlikely that he and Kelly had just stumbled upon a new local legend, or perhaps something bigger. He did not know. Already he was beginning to dismiss the idea however. He had come to believe that there was a rational, logical, and thoroughly disappointing explanation for everything. This would be no different.

Soon enough the two found themselves in an almost vacant computer room. In one corner, a group of students were all gathered around one screen, Kelly could not see what was on the screen, nor did she really care.

Other then this group and themselves, the room was deserted. Most of the students had chosen to spend the lunch hour outdoors, or lingering in assorted corridors.

Seachnall pulled one of the seats to a nearby computer and typed his username and password into the waiting menu. Kelly remained standing and watched the screen intently over his shoulder.

When the machine finally showed Seachnall's user area, he clicked the Internet explorer icon and soon found himself trying to remember the website for the local newspaper, which normally he never looked at. He wasn't even sure of the name.

After four failed attempts, the two gave up and reached the website through a search engine.

There were two reports of car crashes, neither of them however took place anywhere near the school, nor did the registration plates match what they could make out of the one in Kelly's school bag.

They checked the collection of the day's news stories three times over before checking the articles from up to two months ago.

"Well," Seachnall said, his shock made it difficult to form a coherent sentence, "That's unusual."

Kelly also felt shock, despite the fact that some irrational part of her mind had been expecting this. Her suspicion that there was much more to the plate then met the eye was now confirmed.

"So what now?" Seachnall asked, his voice still partially subdued by shock.

"I don't know." Kelly replied quietly, not wanting to draw attention to herself, "But you can't tell anyone about this, not yet. Ok?"

"OK." He replied, wondering whether or not remaining silent was a smart thing to do.

A loud ring informed the two that the lunch hour had ended. This forceful yank back to everyday life was welcome with either Seachnall or Kelly.

"Shit." He said.

"I'll see you on the bus," Kelly said, "And I'll try and find out more about this tonight, or about things randomly appearing out of nowhere or," she cut herself off, as equally unsure of what to say as she was of what to look for that was related to the situation, "well, I'll see what I can find."

"Same here." Seachnall replied, "I'll see you later."

"Bye."

**To be continued.**


	4. I have to obey him

**Thanks to CaptainLoneStarUSA for reviewing. If I ever get around to watching Kill Bill then I shall read your story.**

**I'm feeling unnervingly inspired at the moment which is why this new chapter is up so quickly. Hence I'll hold off replies until the next chapter and wait to see if any more reviews arrive first.**

**Chapter 4: I have to obey him**

_You should already know that – Frank_

Fairfax hadn't changed much. Not that he'd been gone that long, not today anyway.

Donnie hadn't expected the house to be an exception to this rule, but looking at it now, he noticed that it was darker then the other houses on the street, as if a large shadow hung over it. There didn't seem to be anything around him that could cause this however.

If it was cold he couldn't feel it, or didn't want to. He could hear the rushing wind around him, and he could see a handful of fallen autumn leaves, that had remained on the street in the early winter months, being blown down the road in the direction that he remembered the school bus travelling down.

He cast the image from his mind; he hadn't come to admire the local scenery, or to reminisce.

"You won't like what you see." Frank said, his face unreadable, and still hidden behind the mask.

"Why?" Donnie asked, concern slipping into his voice. Had something happened to them since his death? What was Frank talking about? "What happened? Is every...?"

"They won't see you."

"Why not? I mean, I saw you when..."

Frank's head moved slowly to look at Donnie. Though there were no outward signs, Donnie could almost feel Frank's frustration.

"They won't see you." He repeated, his voice much slower and far colder.

There was silence for a few minutes. Donnie's first instinct was to ask why again, but he abandoned this idea. It wouldn't get any answers, and since Frank was the closest thing he had to a guide in the new state of being he had been cast into, his first inclination was to trust him. Although part of him still wanted to kill him for what he had done for Gretchen. Despite the fact that Frank was the reason the two were together, (first in life and now in death,) the image of the car running over and snapping Gretchen's body still brought forth anger in him.

Donnie took a few steps forward. Initially, his surroundings didn't seem to adjust themselves as he moved. The house did not grow marginally bigger as he advanced; the road he was standing on seemed to have moved with him.

Then the surroundings all moved at once.

The house flew towards him. It came so close that Donnie could see the cracks in the paintwork on the door. Less then a second afterwards, his instincts kicked in and his arms flew up to defend himself against the advancing house before he realised that it had stopped.

The road had been pushed far behind him, it also seemed to have been pushed downwards, the street now looked tilted, and stretched at the points where the pavement met the front gardens of the houses.

A few seconds later, the world around him seemed to snap back into place. The house retreated back to where it was, the road rushed back to where Donnie was standing, only now Donnie found himself a few steps closer to the house.

Donnie returned his hands to his sides. The sudden fear that had gripped him when the house rushed towards him was slowly beginning to fade. After a few seconds, he turned his head around to where Frank had been standing, intending to ask him exactly what had just happened.

Frank was nowhere to be seen.

A smaller, yet still sizable amount of fear gripped Donnie. He was far from ready to do little short of anything it seemed without his bunny suit wearing mentor's guidance, without Frank, he was, and would stay lost; and Frank knew that as well as he did, so why had he left?

Donnie turned back around to face the house, only to find Frank standing about half a meter in front of him. This sight initially startled him, and then led to him feeling understandably irritated.

"What the hell was that?" Donnie virtually shouted.

"Perspective." Came Frank's cryptic reply.

"Perspective?"

Frank didn't respond. He turned back around to face the house moments before the front door quietly opened. Moments later, two weary looking figures stepped out. Both were carrying suitcases.

Donnie couldn't make out who they were initially, but the sight of white hair soon identified one of the two people as his father, Edward Darko. The other appeared to be his sister Elizabeth.

Edward opened the boot of a car he didn't recognise that was parked next to the family car. The two then lifted the assorted suitcases into it.

"Are you sure that's everything?" Though his father was at least fifteen meters away, Donnie could hear him as well as if he was standing right next to him. The voice sounded almost calm, but there was an unmistakable underlying sadness within it.

"Yeah," there was the same sadness in his sister's voice, "Yeah I checked everywhere."

"I'm sorry your mother couldn't be here for this, if she could have gotten someone to take Sam to the..."

"It's ok, she had to take Samantha for an inoculation, it's no big deal. Besides, I'll see her when I come home at the weekend."

Donnie wondered briefly where Elizabeth was vanishing off to. After a few moments he remembered her telling him one morning that she had been accepted into Harvard, where she was now presumably heading.

His father placed the last of the suitcases into the boot and closed it. He then turned around and leaned backwards on the car.

"I only wish your brother was still here to see this." His voice was chocked slightly.

"Yeah," Elizabeth added, her voice was quieter now, "He'd probably be thrilled that there was one less contestant for the bathroom in the mornings."

A short-lived, sad laugh was the response to this.

"Seriously though," Elizabeth continued, "I wish he..." She trailed off, unable to complete her sentence.

Donnie wanted more then anything to walk up to them and show them that he was alright. The fact that they were talking about him like he was gone and he was in fact standing only a few meters away was almost unbearable.

He was about to walk towards them when he remembered Frank's earlier message. They wouldn't see him. He could walk right up to them and they wouldn't know he was there.

And then it hit him.

He was gone.

He was dead, and that was how he would stay. He couldn't go back and pick up the pieces of his old life. Those had vanished the instant the plane engine had fallen through his roof. He couldn't tell his family that he was alright, he couldn't tell anyone that they didn't need to mourn.

Then again, why not. As he had said, Frank had manifested himself, and as he had said, he could do anything he wanted. He had even said that Donnie could, so why couldn't he?

After a few moments of thinking, he could think of only one reason why he couldn't go back to his life, why he couldn't say goodbye to anyone, why he couldn't even take one step forward.

Frank wouldn't allow it.

**To be continued.**


	5. Death's Due

**Thanks once more to all reviewers; replies are below:**

**CaptainLoneStarUSA: Pfft, you can't let fear of failure hold you back, if you have an idea for a story then you must write it. Risk of flames, quality and whatever be damned. That's my view anyway. In answer to your question, time is kind of all over the place in this story; the last chapter was set a few months after Donnie's demise. Thanks for reviewing.**

**sYnergY's Duality: The whole film was confusing for all but the unnervingly observant. Even when I watched it five times and scoured through the extras on the DVD it still didn't make sense. YOU DON'T LIKE FRANK?!?! (Faints). Ah well, thanks for reviewing.**

**Right, now onto the chapter.**

**Chapter 5: Death's due**

_He stabbed my mom four times in the chest – _Gretchen

She didn't feel any guilt.

Nor did she feel any reluctance, hesitation or anything that would attempt to dissuade her from her semi-divine intervention. All she felt was an unshakable, cold determination to end the life of the piece of shit that had almost killed her mother, and would succeed in roughly two hours, again, if she didn't stop him here.

Frank had showed her what happened before she returned home, only to find it wrecked and her mother nowhere to be seen. Gretchen had watched as her mother opened the door to see the grinning face of her killer. What followed was chaotic, Gretchen didn't really remember most of it, her mind didn't seem to want to. What she did remember however was the audible crack of her mother's neck breaking.

At the time, she hadn't been fit to do anything except cry out in disbelief and throw the occasional, ineffectual punch at Frank, (simply because he was there,) before falling into his arms in a flood of tears. When she had calmed down a few hours later, which to her felt like a decade. She had been happy when Frank had deposited her by the side of the Highway leading to Fairfax, and left her with the simple instruction, 'Kill him.'

Why he'd done this was unclear, not that she especially cared but she decided she had to have something to preoccupy her whilst she waited for her Stepfather's car to arrive. Maybe Frank was doing this out of some twisted sense of kindness and generosity. Maybe he was trying to turn her into some celestial killer; maybe it was his way of saying sorry for killing her.

Unlike Donnie, she didn't really care that Frank had killed her. She guessed that this was because Frank had in fact saved her. The last moments of her life were spent in panic and grief, she was terrified that her mother had fallen victim to a serial killer, and she was living in a world that was about to fade out of all existence. If Frank hadn't have killed her, she would have died anyway. Now she was alive, in two places, Donnie and her were together again, and in a few minutes, her mother would be safe as well. And the world would be rid of one worthless murdering bastard.

The sound of a distant car engine caused Gretchen's head to snap to the side, she noticed two faint lights in the distance, the car they belonged to was too far away for her to see. She tensed her hands and remembered what Frank had taught her.

"Concentrate." She told herself quietly.

"It isn't him."

Gretchen's eyes shot open and she hastily looked around her. Frank was nowhere to be seen but the voice was undoubtedly his. She nodded, to herself more then him and watched the car advance. As it drove past, the driver, a female in her late thirties by the looks of things, cast a surprised glance in her direction. Seeing teenage girls standing by highways in the early hours of the evening was by the looks of things something of a rarity for her. Soon enough however, she returned her attention to the road. Before long the car disappeared from sight.

She was surprised by the lack of cars on the road. Even though it was Halloween and people would probably be home so that later they could wander with their offspring around the town to pester others for treats, or would be home wondering whether they were alright or vandalising somebody's car; she had still expected so see a fair few cars on the road. This would have made her task more difficult, but for some reason, which she was thankful for, the road was all but deserted.

The sound of another car emerged from the distance. Gretchen turned her head around to examine the newcomer and she didn't need Frank to tell her that it was her Stepfather. The car, judging from the shaking headlights, was veering slightly from left to right. The driver it seemed had trouble travelling in a straight line.

_He's been drinking_ Gretchen thought briefly before taking a few steps out of the way, ensuring that she would remain unseen.

A cold smile formed on her face as she closed her eyes and concentrated once again. If Frank had any comments, he kept them to herself, her smile widened as this silence confirmed that her Stepfather was approaching.

At first, nothing happened. _You're trying to hard,_ she told herself _come on, remember what Frank told you._

She relaxed as best as she could and tried again. The noise of the car was growing louder; if she failed here then she wasn't sure that she could reach him in time to save her mother, and possibly herself for all she knew.

She pushed down the panic that accompanied this thought as far as it would go and concentrated. She had done this before, during two events that could only be described as practices. Then it had come so easily to her, now, when it mattered, the task seemed next to impossible.

She inhaled deeply, and forced what panic and doubt she could out of her; and then breathed a heavy sigh of relief as she felt the portal open.

A few moments afterwards, the sound of the car changed from the normal low-pitched sound of the engine to a loud screech of the tyres. He'd seen the portal, and he'd felt the shock of seeing something unexpected suddenly appear out of nowhere in front of him. Now he was trying to avoid it.

But he wasn't going to.

Gretchen watched as the car, which was now in an uncontrollable spin, passed off of the highway, through the portal, into a section of the Atlantic Ocean that was hundreds of miles from any stretch of land.

A shout emerged from the other side shortly after the car hit the water. It was a curious fusion of disbelief, panic and outrage. A brutal part of Gretchen that had never before come to the surface wanted to laugh, and did as soon as the idea came to her.

She walked towards the portal and glared through it to see idyllic weather, blue sea as far as she could see, and her Stepfather clambering to the hood of the car that was advancing further and further into the water.

He cast another look at the portal, just as she hoped he would, she wanted him to see who had killed him. He wanted him to see the face of the face of the one whose life he had made a misery for two seemingly unending years.

The look of disbelief on his disbelief on his face was almost as strong as the one he had produced when the portal opened.

And then it was gone.

Gretchen closed closed the portal, after giving a small sadistic wave, and left her Stepfather to drown in the middle of nowhere.

**To be continued.**

**(Gretchen's out of character, I know. Trust me there's a good reason for this).**


	6. First Impressions

**Thanks once more to all reviewers, sorry it took me a while to update but things have been awkward here.**

**Replies are at the end of the chapter.**

**Chapter 6: First impressions**

_The living receiver is often tormented by terrifying dreams, Visions and auditory hallucinations during his/her time within the tangent universe. – _From the philosophy of time travel.

Kelly sat at her computer, hastily searching through whatever she could find that seemed even remotely relevant to what had happened to her that day. Unfortunately, there seemed to be no adequate term to describe what had happened that she would be helpful if typed into a search engine.

After searching through various 'Urban legend' web sites, her investigation was reduced to her typing 'Weird registration plates appearing out of nowhere', 'unexplained burnt metal things' and similar phrases into Google in an attempt to amuse herself. There seemed to be nothing else that she could do.

Rather unsurprisingly, the internet yielded no helpful information, nor did Seachnall when she phoned him later that night.

"I'm not really sure what I'm meant to be looking for." He said after they both uttered the usual conversation starting pleasantries.

"Me neither." Kelly replied, "Not surprising really, after all when was the last time you heard of something like this happening."

"Speaking of," Seachnall replied before pausing to eat another peanut from a bowl by his desk, "I listened to the local news on the radio when I got back, still no mention of car wrecks or anything like that."

"Strange."

"Well that goes without saying really."

Despite what had happened in the school's computer room, Seachnall was still expecting to stumble across a disappointing, logical explanation as to why a charred registration plate had come to rest in the grass near the school minus the charred car it had come from. It was yet to happen.

"You don't think you could get something by typing the registration plate number into Google do you?" Kelly asked suddenly, forcing Seachnall's attention back to the conversation, "Like maybe what kind of car it belongs to, who owns it, that sort of thing."

"I don't know, I'm naturally pessimistic however as you know so I'll say probably not. Besides, you don't have the whole number."

"I've got most of..."

Kelly paused as she came to the same conclusion that Seachnall did; that even if they had the whole number, it probably wouldn't do any good. Also, the idea of sifting through dozens of number and letter combinations, hoping to get lucky in the process wasn't overly appealing.

"If this is some strange paranormal find you found Kel," Seachnall said, "Maybe we could sell it to local news or some paranormal society or someone like that and cash in."

"No." The word came out harsher then she intended, she could picture Seachnall's shocked reaction. "I mean, not yet, I want to find out what the story is with this thing, it's probably nothing anyway."

"Yeah," Seachnall replied with a mock sigh, "You're probably right."

"Aren't I always?"

A faint laugh was Seachnall's response. Afterwards there was a brief moment of silence as the two considered the subject, as well as their options silently.

"Sneezer!" Came the faint call through the receiver of Kelly's mobile phone, "Dinner's ready."

'Sneezer' was a name given to Seachnall by Elena one spring when he was set upon by havfever and sneezing almost continually. This nickname had spread from friends to his family one day when Kelly was round his house. Seachnall loathed this name.

"Alright!" Seachnall bellowed in reply. "Be down in a minute."

"See you tomorrow." Kelly said.

"It's Saturday tomorrow."

"Oh yeah. How about we go into town tomorrow? Talk about this without adding to phone bills. You can even buy me lunch."

"Your generosity knows no bounds my saintly friend." Seachnall said, sarcasm filling every word, "Alright, we might as well, there's bugger all else to do."

"Great, see you later Sneezer."

"Don't call me th..."

Kelly grinned as she pressed the button to cut Seachnall off and switch off her phone.

"Kel." Sounded the voice of her mother from downstairs, "Dinner."

Kelly turned around to face the door, and found herself face to face with Frank.

Instantly she froze, paralysed by her initial started feeling. She was unable to do anything but stare at the figure in the demonic bunny suit before her. Her mind seemed barely able to register the figure's presence.

Surprise and alarm was giving way to fear. As Kelly's mind gradually returned to partial working order, she took several steps backwards and searched for something with which she could swing at the intruder, preferably something sharp and heavy.

As she did this she opened her mouth to call to her parents downstairs, in an instant a multitude of thoughts hastily sprung to mind, '_Had this guy gone through them to get up here?' 'Had he hurt them, killed...?'_

No more thoughts interrupted her actions, fuelled by her anger; Kelly grabbed the wooden chair by her desk and swung it at the intruder. Everything seemed to move half as fast as usual, and the Bunny suited intruder seemed content to simply grin at her.

Kelly swung the chair at Frank, instead of impacting on his chest however; it impacted on a watery barrier that Frank had summoned, the chair wouldn't have done any significant damage to him, but the barrier would make things easier in the long run. A sharp pain stung Kelly's wrists as the chair struck this, and the chair fell to the floor with a loud thud.

This sight added to Kelly's fear, as well as her confusion. This was insane, force fields or whatever the hell it was that had stopped her and her weapon in mid flight didn't just appear out of nowhere, neither did strange people in Bunny suits.

"Cars aren't good for you this month."

His voice was not human; there was no way that any normal person could sound like that. Fear grew steadily in Kelly's mind and she abandoned all attempts to make sense of the situation. Instead she simply retreated away from the figure.

And then he was gone.

It took a few minutes for Kelly's mind to recognise this, for what seemed like hours, all she could do was stare at the space where Frank had stood and try to remain silent.

"Kelly," came another shout from downstairs, "I said you're dinner's ready! And what was that crashing noise?"

Relief at the confirmation of her parent's wellbeing flooded through her, Kelly clung to this, focusing intently on it so as to banish as much of the fear as possible.

"Nothing." She replied after a few seconds, her voice as casual as she could make it but still chocked. "I'll be down in a minute."

She moved to the mirror, her eyes scanning the room for anything that didn't belong there as she did so. She then spent a few moments attempting to make herself look like someone who hadn't been paralysed by fear only a few minutes ago.

When she was suitably satisfied with her appearance, she headed downstairs.

**To be continued.**

**Right, now for replies:**

**sYnergY's Duality: It's always fun to deal out bizarre and unusual death to those who deserve them in fan fictions, thanks for reviewing.**

**CaptainLoneStarUSA: One Gretchen, who died in the tangent universe, is in the fourth dimension construct, (which she also uses to influence the primary/tangent universe) as a manipulated dead person, the other, who lives on because of Donnie's time travelling lives on in this new one. The whole thing is very confusing, thanks for reviewing.**

**Vademecum: Thanks, always nice to see new reviewers, I like the assorted theories as well, and that the answers weren't simply handed out at the end like in most other films, anyway, thanks for reviewing.**

**PennyLane125: If you go to , you should find a clear, fuzzless philosophy of time travel. Also, it was the dead Gretchen that killed her stepfather via the fourth dimension construct. There's a lot of time travel involved for the three dead characters, this was shortly before the Halloween party. Thanks for reviewing.**

**Beacons: Thanks, it's pretty hard to describe some of he things in the story in a way which doesn't seem implausible or idiotic. It's nice to see I've succeeded this far. Thanks for reviewing.**


	7. Omen

**Thanks once more to all reviewers; sorry it took me a while to update once again.**

**Anyway, onwards to chapter 7,**

**Chapter 7: Omen**

_We are told that these things occur for a reason – _From the philosophy of time travel.

Kelly hadn't slept, and the caffeine that was coursing through her veins could only do so much to keep her conscious.

She had thought about staying home, but decided against it. If she'd stayed home she'd constantly be looking over her shoulder wherever she turned, waiting for whatever the hell had appeared in her room yesterday to come back.

Why a public place should be any safer for a creature that can appear and disappear at will and do God knows what else was a mystery, but Kelly still felt safer in the bustling city centre.

_What the fuck is going on?_

First, Kelly had stumbled across the registration plate of a car that seemed to have vanished without a trace, now she had been visited by a ghost in a Bunny suit. She wondered briefly if the two could be connected somehow, but she could picture any plausible connections; except for one.

His, or its message made no sense to her either. She had repeated it to herself over and over again last night and her mind kept coming back to the charred registration plate that she had plucked from the grass.

The only logical conclusion, for the moment, was that this guy was the ghost of the driver. If he'd been wearing the suit at the time then no wonder he'd crashed. If that was the case, maybe he was pissed off that she moved the registration plate. Or maybe the two had nothing to do with each other. She had too many questions and not nearly enough answers to make anything except for one sketchy guess.

Despite what she had seen in the last few days, the whole idea of ghosts and the supernatural still seemed to be nothing more then fiction. Kelly hadn't believed in ghosts since she was six, and even now, the notion still seemed hard to believe.

It hadn't been a dream; she knew that, she hadn't been dreaming, hallucinating, taking LSD or doing anything that could have made the experience a simple trick of the mind. What she had seen was real, as real as the registration plate that was hidden under her mattress.

She yawned and resisted the urge to rest her head on her arms and try and sleep on the picnic table she was sat at. She had gone without sleep before and felt, more or less, fine the day after, but having to spend an entire night waiting in fear for an ethereal assailant to arrive was a draining task to say the least.

After roughly five more minutes, Seachnall emerged out of the crowd of passers by, he was dressed in his usual nondescript clothes that he thought was a cry of individuality.

Seachnall abhorred brand names and anyone who wore them. When prompted he could talk for hours about glaring injustice for the workforce, no discernable difference in quality, paying for the label, and at least a dozen other subjects that could put the listener into a trance.

"Hi." He said, causing Kelly to realise that she had kept staring at the spot where she'd noticed him instead of his path towards her.

"Hi" she muttered weakly before pushing herself to her feet.

"Are you alright?" Seachnall asked, noticing the marks of fatigue in her face.

Kelly let out a groan of fatigue that soon developed into a yawn. She was unsure whether to tell Seachnall about what had happened, if this was a ghost that was pissed off about his missing registration plate, (the words sounded ridiculous even as she thought them), then Seachnall should know what had happened, in case the beast came to visit him.

"I didn't sleep well." She uttered instead, unsure of where to begin. Or how to describe the experience in such a way that would cause Seachnall to do something other then wander off and phone the nice men with white shirts and plenty of jackets with extra long sleeves.

Unbidden, a mental image of a psychiatrist telling her that there was no such thing as ghosts in rabbit suits sprung to mind. She laughed slightly at this thought.

"Kel." Seachnall's voice sounded like this was the third or fourth time he'd uttered her name. It was the first time her mind had registered it though.

"Sorry," she mentally shook herself, trying to force out the weariness.

"Are you sure you're alright?"

"Yes." Kelly replied, forcing irritation into her voice, hoping that it would sound convincing. "You hungry."

"Yeah," Seachnall said slowly, casting one final inquisitive glare at Kelly's face, "Ah, before we do anything I have to get to the post office, I told my Dad I'd take care of this." He reached into his coat's pocket and pulled out a small parcel.

"Alright." Kelly said, pleased to be walking which was a surprisingly less tiring thing then sitting in her current state.

"Did you find anything else out?" She asked, suppressing another yawn.

"Nothing." The tone of Seachnall's voice sounded like he wanted to say 'nothing yet'. It also sounded like he was trying to convince himself that that was what he believed.

"Me neither. I was thinking though, maybe we're be..."

"Look out!"

Kelly's head snapped upwards as she heard Seachnall's shout. She had barely enough time to realise that she'd stepped onto the road before she felt two hands grasp her upper arms firmly and drag her back onto the pavement.

A car screeched past, the noises it produced told her that the driver had braked hard to try and avoid hitting her. A few seconds later there was also an angry sounding shout from an open window.

Sudden fear and adrenaline surged through Kelly, fighting away the weariness. Several people were now glaring in her general direction, she didn't care.

"What the hell is wrong with you?" Seachnall's voice betrayed his own shock and concern, as well as irritation. His grip on her arms remained.

"Cars aren't good for you this month."

The voice wasn't something she imagined or a memory. It was him again; it was the bunny-suited spectre returning to repeat his message. Was this what he was warning her about? It made no sense.

_What the fuck did he want?_

**To be continued.**


	8. Stumbling in Darkness

**Sorry for the wait and thanks to all reviewers, i'll be replying in the next chapter, which will hopefully be up sooner then this one, and you may find some formatting errors here.**

**Chapter 8: Stumbling in darkness**

"There's something I want to show you" – Frank

Donnie watched the scene unfolding before him whilst perched on a nearby streetlight. Logic dictated that he should have fallen to the hard concrete pavement below due to the unbalanced mass, however logic also dictated that he shouldn't be wandering around after his death, and that a misplaced plane engine couldn't destroy all of creation.

Logic was deceptive.

Below him, the commotion caused by the new living receiver almost being run down by a passing BMW was dying out. People were concluding their judgemental gazes and returning to their daily business. Her friend still held her arms as if they would fall off if he let go. She herself just looked exhausted, like she wanted to fall asleep on the pavement and let the world move away from her. Donnie could relate.

He threw himself off the streetlight and onto the pavement, landing in a graceless heap. He didn't feel any pain, and since no one could see him, no one turned to gaze at what would have been yet another seemingly fortuitous defying of death, although this one would have been slightly harder to accept then a girl almost getting run over.

Donnie pushed himself to his feet and moved closer so that he could listen in to whatever would be said. Frank had told him to 'watch and learn' before depositing him here. Donnie guessed that he could probably have made himself hear see or hear what he needed from the streetlight, but it just seemed easier this way.

"Are you alright?" He heard the guy ask, his voice sounded as if he couldn't think of anything more suitable to ask, despite his best efforts.

Kelly, or whatever Frank had said her name was, didn't respond. She just stared blankly at his face as if trying to find something hidden there.

Eventually she shook herself and pushed out a long breath. This was different to what Donnie remembered, during his stint as the living receiver, he had found himself as nothing more then an observer in his own body during the initial stages when Frank decided to intervene. When he had been made to flood the school or burn down Jim Cunningham's house, (an act that still gave him a strange feeling of pride), he had felt like he was dreaming, or watching through someone else's weary eyes.

This girl was, basically, someone who had seen a monster in their bedroom and freaked out. She had been, and would be again, paralysed with fear.

Frank had to know that that would be the result, so why did he need her like this?

"Kelly?" It seemed that the guy, Donnie had long since forgotten his name, had finally removed his hands from Kelly's arms. She seemed to be having trouble standing on her own.

-------------------------------

Kelly could barely stand up, it was all she could do to stare up into Seachnall's face and hope that would be enough to get him to stop asking questions.

It was too much, less then a week ago she'd been a normal, reasonably happy person with friends, family and a healthy loathing for any and all things related to school. Now she was surrounded by unexplainable happenings. A phantom registration plate and a ghost had appeared before her and shot to Hell everything she had come to accept about how the universe worked. (Next to all that, the thought of almost being run over seemed largely unimportant), Her terror had made her three steps beyond exhausted, all she wanted to do was sleep and she couldn't do that here.

Her body had other ideas however. The last traces of energy seemed to vanish from Kelly, her legs gave way and she began to fall backwards.

Seachnall noticed and lunged forward. He managed to get one hand behind her head and one on her back before she hit the concrete. She ended up hanging at an almost 45 degree angle in Seachnall's steadily weakening grip.

He pulled her back to her feet, trying to jerk her into consciousness and strengthen his grip at the same time. Distantly he wondered why she had come out here considering the state she was in.

People were beginning to stare now, no one stopped however, to passers-by this was nothing more then a diversion on their way to wherever. One person asked whether Kelly was all right, Seachnall ignored them, and they carried on as if nothing had happened.

Noticing a number of benches that were clustered around a tree that was sticking out of a small square of soil in the pavement, Seachnall half carried, half ragged Kelly's sleeping form over to an empty one that looked cleaner then most. She mumbled a series of incomprehensible words, the tone of which seemed to show weary protest.

Ignoring further glares from onlookers, Seachnall deposited Kelly's sleeping form on the bench. Her head sloped forward and for a moment it looked as if the rest of her would follow it and collapse on the floor. Seachnall extended his hand towards her once more and pushed her upper body back into the seat by the shoulder.

This was thoroughly uncharacteristic of Kelly, she was far from being an idiot, and normally she wouldn't consider going somewhere if she didn't feel up to it. Why then had she dragged her exhausted self here? Why was she so exhausted in the first place? What had happened to her?

--------------------------------------

Gretchen walked up beside Donnie, she watched Seachnall and Kelly with a nonchalant facial expression that concealed her true feelings perfectly, she had always had the enviable ability to hide what she was feeling behind a facade of calm detachment.

"Poor kids." She muttered distantly, as much to herself as to Donnie.

_Kids_ Donnie thought, it was a strange choice of word, technically those two were, more or less, the same age as he and Gretchen. Then again, in their plain of existence almost 20 years had passed. Donnie felt a mild surprise towards the lack of surprise he now felt for these seemingly impossible happenings, he guessed that he was finally getting used to them.

"She'll be fine" Donnie replied finally, trying to conceal his amusement at Seachnall's struggle to wake her.

"Fine?" Gretchen turned to face Donnie; there was no calm impassiveness in her face now, she looked at Donnie with what could only be described as confused anger, "Haven't you seen what happens to them?"

"No, why?" Donnie looked confused, this conformation helped Gretchen lose some of her anger, she turned back towards Kelly and Seachnall.

Almost on cue, what looked like a portal began to rip through the surroundings, no one apart from Donnie and Gretchen seemed to notice it, people were passing effortlessly through it, on the other side was an almost blinding white light, it didn't seem to lead anywhere.

"Watch closely." Donnie barely shuddered at the sound of Frank's voice in his head. It had happened too frequently.

Darkness seemed to creep into the rectangular quasi-portal from the edges; it began to swirl about the centre before suddenly spreading out and taking shape.

There was what looked like an area of grass next to a building, Donnie didn't recognise it, nor did he recognise the man with a crowbar in his hand, it seemed to be dripping blood onto the floor. He also recognised Seachnall, who also had blood dripping down his face.

The man swung the crowbar again, this time it collided with Seachnall's stomach. He uttered a pained, breathless groan and collapsed onto his knees, bending forward and cradling his battered insides as he did so.

Somewhere in the distance, a place that was not shown by the makeshift screen, screaming could be heard. Kelly's screaming.

The man with the crowbar dropped it to the floor, reaching into his coat; he pulled out another weapon, a knife.

He gripped Seachnall's hair and pulled his head back, he then buried the knife deep into Seachnall's throat. His face looked vacant now, as if the pain or maybe a previous blow to the head had numbed his senses.

The man pushed Seachnall to the floor and hastily moved off screen, towards the direction of the screaming.

**To be continued.**


	9. Rest

**Sorry to all for the wait, twas the season and writing anything had to take second place to other things. Thanks again to all reviewers, may your microwaves remain free of explosives.**

**Replies are at the end of the chapter,**

**Chapter 9: Rest**

_The Manipulated Living are often the close friends and neighbours of the Living Receiver. – _From the philosophy of Time Travel

Almost an hour passed before Kelly woke. After blinking and uttering a few pained, weary groans, she pushed herself into a more upright seated position and gazed around her.

The first thing she noticed were the pedestrians moving back and forth, some casting a quasi-interested glance in her direction. She became more alert when the realisation that she was outside as well as the memories leading up to her passing out in exhaustion came to her.

Her half closed eyes shot open and immediately her head snapped from side to side, her eyes soon found Seachnall's face. He was sitting next to her and staring at her with an expression that merged anger and concern.

"How long was…"

"An hour." Seachnall said quickly, he was trying to make his voice sound deadpan, but the feelings shown on his face were mirrored in his voice.

There was a moment of silence after this, in which Kelly felt a sudden surge of embarrassment. She had always attempted to maintain an image of respectability and dignity wherever she went, part of this included not passing out on busy streets and having to be dragged to a park bench to sleep.

Then again, these were special circumstances; the ghost of a guy in a bunny costume was haunting her.

_And once I explain that to Seachnall and all the nice people they'll understand why I felt the need to take a nap in the middle of the street._

She shook her head and almost smiled at the thought. The seemingly insane situation, for the moment at least, didn't have the same daunting, soul crushing feel to it that it had an hour ago. It would probably return before too long.

"Are you alright?" Seachnall asked, stopping Kelly's train of thought. He knew that this was a stupid question; after all, if she were all right she wouldn't be passing out in the middle of the high street. Nevertheless, he felt he should ask.

Kelly didn't reply directly, she only looked at him, her face now alternating between deadpan and haunted. After a few seconds she stood up.

Her back and legs felt sore from her nap on the hard, jagged bench, she stretched herself slightly and tried to shake the feeling away.

"Are you alright?" Seachnall replied, his voice sterner this time, he stood up next to her and began to extend a hand to her shoulder before hastily changing his mind and returning it to its side.

"Yes." Kelly replied in a tone of voice that screamed the opposite.

"Good," Seachnall didn't believe her, but he said 'good' anyway, "Now what's going on?"

She looked at him again, trying to find some clue hidden amongst his facial features as to how she could tell him what had happened in a way that wouldn't make her sound like a nutcase.

There was nothing, but she soon found that she no longer cared, pride was a thing for those with no experience with terror.

So she told him everything.

* * *

They walked as she told him the story, as she did so, Seachnall didn't speak out in disbelief at this unexpected ghost story, he didn't actually speak at all, he simply nodded and cast the occasional surprised facial expression in Kelly's direction.

After she had finished explaining, there was a moment of silence. Seachnall stared at the floor, clearly lost in thought. For a moment, Kelly thought she could see a glimmer of fear on his face, but it soon faded.

When the silence went on for a longer period of time then she'd have liked she decided to break it.

"You think I'm crazy don't you?"

He didn't, throughout the story, Kelly had sounded like her usual, quasi-sane self would if frightened. The fear and frustration in her voice couldn't be fake, and that meant she couldn't have made that story up, what she claimed to have happened had to have happened, or at least she had to believe it had happened.

"No." He said simply.

Relief flooded through Kelly, she had been counting on Seachnall to help her figure all this madness out, and she'd half expected him to dismiss her instantly as one deserving of a straint jacket, or worse, as simply joking with him. If he had come to that conclusion then convincing him what he said was the truth would be next to impossible.

They walked on in silence for a few more minutes, Kelly turned her head to take in the details of her surroundings as she waited for Seachnall to say something, it was his turn to break the silence. For now, she was happy to enjoy the quiet of her surroundings.

Not long after, she noticed the kid with the large hole in his chest.

He was walking towards her, and passing straight through lines of pedestrians as he did so. No one seemed to notice as this person, who judging be the gaping hole in his gut should have bled to death.

There was less fear this time. This was due partially to experience with supernatural occurrences, plus the fact that she no longer felt that she was alone in her experiences with the dead, and also because this disembowelled male teenager did not look overly daunting or threatening.

She was about to point out his presence to Seachnall, but he wouldn't see him either she guessed, and if she started pointing out invisible phantoms, what little credibility she had was likely to vanish.

She also considered trying to avoid this new spectre, but running would have an equally disastrous effect on her story, and maybe her sanity. Also, it seemed as if she might finally get some answers.

Donnie moved next to Kelly and began to walk next to her. She kept her head facing forward, not addressing this newcomer. She also tried, with limited success, to maintain an appearance of calm that she did not feel.

"He won't come tonight." He said suddenly, his sounded almost sad, "Try and get some sleep."

There was nothing but the noise of pedestrians after that, after roughly two minutes, Kelly risked a sideways glance, the ghost or whatever it was, was gone.

To be continued

**Right, now for replies,**

**CaptainLonestarUSA: In answer to your question, yeah pretty much. I'm trying to make the characters different from the movie types however as you probably noticed, I don't want to end up cloning the film. Anyway, thanks for reviewing.**

**Vampyre-Goddess-Lavine: I can't think of anything to write other then a simple thanks for reviewing and that I can't think of anything to write apart from a simple 'thanks for reviewing', ah well, thanks for reviewing and glad you've enjoyed thus far.**

**sYnergY's Duality: Kelly's role in the whole thing should be pointed out before too long, I think, I'm currently debating how long to make this story, whether I should get to the point quickly or flesh it out with more chapters like chapter 5. Ah well, thanks for reviewing.**

**PennyLane125: I did send that link didn't I? I can't for the life of me remember, oh well, if I haven't then let me know, I think I did, ah well anyway, thanks for reviewing and glad you've enjoyed this fic.**


	10. Third Person Perspective

**Thanks again to all reviewers and sorry it's taken me a while to update. I've had exams. Hated filthy things, Grrr, Hiss.**

**Yeas well, those are finished now, and I intend to write and update religiously for the next week or so you might get 2 or 3 updates quite soon.**

**I've also made this chapter slightly longer then usual, at least I intend to.**

**Chapter 10: Third person perspective**

_'You're weird' - Gretchen_

Donnie walked amongst the crowds of passing pedestrians and tried to banish the depression that Gretchen's display had given him.

He had almost forgotten about his life in the tangent universe, the almost overwhelming sensations that had pushed him to the edge of his already questionable sanity were a distant memory, hidden behind his new experiences and status as an angel or whatever the hell he was.

It still made no sense whatsoever, but that didn't matter.

The new living receiver was different. She was one of the people that Donnie saw wandering past him, as oblivious to the danger facing them as they were to the kid walking past them with a large gaping hole in his chest. This girl had so much to live for, whereas he had had so much to die for.

Would she die?

Donnie assumed that Frank had chosen him because of his tendency to sleepwalk. It made him easier to manipulate. There were other factors too that Donnie believed made him a suitable living receiver. For as long as he could remember, Donnie had always felt separated from the world, everyone in it seemed to know what their place and purpose was. They knew what they were, what they wanted and they seemed to live with such casual ease. He on the other hand couldn't do this. For him, everything had to make sense, and more often then not it didn't. He couldn't accept that, despite the fact that he didn't seem to have much choice.

Questioning the world often resulted in his parents or teachers rebuking him, basically telling him to shut up and accept what the collective minds of humanity had accepted as truth because they were too closed minded to accept or even consider that maybe everything they believed to be true about the universe was wrong.

Eventually, his disgust with the world's collection of closed minded idiots had caused Donnie to lash out. Specifically, to burn down part of his school. This led to his subsequent incarceration at the Clearview juvenile detention centre.

After this, Donnie had forced himself to conform as much as possible, which still more often then not was not enough for the world. He repeatedly found himself getting in trouble at school, receiving suspensions. Also having therapy forced upon him, which was a humiliating experience to say the least.

Although in retrospect he guessed it was a good thing, it helped him save the world, or it helped Frank save the world, he wasn't entirely sure.

There was isolation as well, those few people who didn't immediately dismiss him as a freak or a loser had always viewed him as an eccentric, a special needs case that had to be treated with care so as to avoid incurring his wrath.

When adolescence it, this became doubly hard. Before Gretchen, Donnie believed that it would be easier for him to give birth then get a girlfriend. No one seemed able to accept and love him for who he was, and he would not change for anyone.

Gretchen was different.

Reflecting on their brief time together in the tangent universe, Donnie remembered that conversations with Gretchen typically swerved towards more interesting and deep issues then 'who's sleeping with whom' and 'who was an arsehole'. She seemed to share his mutual love and hatred of the world, and was willing to consider that maybe there was more out there then what she could see.

They were soul mates, for lack of a better word.

Her death had been the catalyst that stole away Donnie's will to live. After he had watched the one person he had truly loved have her neck snapped, his mind resigned to a half-conscious desire to end his suffering. Frank knew this would happen, it was why he'd directed Gretchen to Middlesex, why he'd killed her.

Donnie shook the images away and returned his train of thought to why Kelly had been chosen. Would she be able to accept what was happening to her? Would she be able to survive the stresses and torments that would befall her? Would she emerge with her life and sanity intact?

He doubted it.

"Trust me." The sudden sound of Frank's voice in his head startled Donnie, he quickly turned round to see if Frank was lurking behind him or hidden from view.

Sure enough, there was Frank, still wearing the bunny suit, but not the headpiece for reasons known only to himself. His eye was back.

"Do you want her to die?" Frank asked, his voice its usual creepy monotone.

"No." Donnie replied.

"Do you want them to die?" With one furry hand, he gestured at the crowd. Donnie was silent for a few moments before responding.

"Needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few, right?"

Frank was silent for a full minute; he simply stared at Donnie with an unchanging nonchalant facial expression.

"Empathy will get them killed." He said finally.

Reluctantly, Donnie nodded in reply, he knew Frank was right, life was not, could not and never should be fair, as Seachnall's and most probably Kelly' untimely death would prove.

"Maybe." Frank said, as if in replies to Donnie's thoughts.

"What?"

Frank turned away and began to walk towards the shopping centres exit. Donnie noticed a man and woman walk hand in hand straight through him, his attention soon turned towards Frank again as he turned back towards him.

"Shit happens, and then it doesn't." He said quietly.

"I don't follow you."

"Follow me now."

With that, Frank resumed his path towards the exit. Donnie waited a few more seconds before walking after him.

* * *

"See you on Monday." Seachnall said as Kelly's house, and the bus stop he needed began to emerge through the houses and trees obscuring them.

"Bye" she said. She took a few steps forward before turning back.

"Seachnall."

"Yeah?"

"Thanks," Kelly paused, "For believing me, and catching me when I passed out on the high street."

Seachnall smiled and shook his head at the memory.

"Don't mention it." His face grew more serious abruptly, "What are you going to do now? I mean if," he paused, as if the words were painful, it was still hard for him to believe that Kelly was being haunted by ghosts, "if you have a ghost to deal with…" He shrugged, hoping that his question segments were sufficient.

"I don't know." Kelly said, the fear returning. Despite the second guy's saying that the bunny suited beast wouldn't appear tonight, she still doubted she'd be able to get through the night without waiting for him to arrive.

Seachnall shrugged again, equally as clueless as to what could be done, and the situation itself.

"If you need anything…" He trailed off again, still half expecting Kelly to start laughing uncontrollably and inform him that she had made the whole thing up.

But she didn't.

Kelly walked quickly back towards Seachnall and flung her arms around him before he could even form a shocked facial expression. It took a few moments for him to recover his wits enough to return her hug. (This too was not something he was used to seeing from Kelly).

After almost a minute, she released Seachnall from her grasp and look at him with a face that curiously mixed embarrassment with contemplation.

"Thank you," she said again before walking away.

**To be continued**


	11. Tools of the trade

**Remind me not to make predictions about updates in the future.**

**Sorry for the wait and thanks to all reviewers. I'll be replying in the next chapter.**

**Chapter 11: Tools of the trade**

'_28 days, 6 hours, 42 minutes, 12 seconds, that is when the world will end.' _– Frank

The sun was all but gone. The cloud filled sky hung over the town. It seemed to be robbing everything of colour. The world around him was silent. The trees had adopted a stoic, motionless state due to the lack of wind. The assorted birds, rodents and insects living in the trees or drains were, for reasons known only to themselves, also silent.

The world felt dead.

Seachnall didn't however. An all too familiar feeling was coursing through him, supplying his body with an almost nervous energy.

_Oh shit, _He thought for the seventh time _I can't be falling for her can I? Please God, not again._

His train of thought was brought to an abrupt halt by the sound of a passing bus. Inside he noticed that there were no passengers and a second later he mentally kicked himself for deciding to walk back to his house instead of waiting for a bus. Despite the lack of wind, the temperature was bordering on freezing, causing pedestrians throughout the town to shiver and complain collectively about the weather.

The walk wasn't a long one. Nevertheless, that bus looked warm.

Seachnall's attention slipped back to its previous contemplation after the bus disappeared around a corner.

At the age of fifteen, with puberty and testosterone making their presence felt more and more often, he had found himself becoming increasingly attracted to Kelly. His attraction and desire were paralleled by fear however, and an unshakable belief that Kelly wasn't interested.

When this showed no sign of changing, Seachnall had pushed himself away, forced himself not to think, or want to think of her as anything except a friend. Until roughly twenty minutes ago, he thought he had succeeded.

Her spontaneous (and tight) hug had brought it all back. Even though he knew that it was just an act of fear, he still…

Fear.

His train of thought then switched, once again, to what the logical part of his mind felt was slightly more important then attraction.

This day had been surreal. Kelly collapsing in the middle of the street would have been strange enough; now there were too many things going on that shouldn't be. The registration plate, that's where it had started, Then, less then a week later, Kelly was being haunted by God knows what.

His scepticism was gone. Or maybe he just didn't want it.

_There's nothing you can do, at least not yet, maybe, I don't know. Just go home, get some sleep; wait.

* * *

_

Kelly slammed her hands onto the padded chair in her room, trying to vent her frustration and not attract the attention of her parents with loud noises at the same time.

_Damn it, you were so close. _She silently screamed at herself,_ Why couldn't you tell him? What's wrong with you?_

Unbeknownst to Seachnall, Kelly was interested, very interested. Like herself however, Seachnall had never given any outward signs to suggest that he viewed her as anything more then a friend. He never seemed to show any interest in anyone, in all the years Kelly had known him, she had never once seen him show the slightest flicker of interest for anyone, female, male or otherwise.

She had never been able to bring herself to tell Seachnall how she felt, partly because she was sure she'd only damage, or destroy their friendship by telling him, and partly because some insufferable part of her would rather hold on to her mediocre existence of sentimentality and endure the resulting feelings of frustration and unrequited longing then take a chance in her life and maybe feel happy for once.

Kelly sighed and tried to force the thoughts from her head. It was nice, in a ay, to know that in spite of all the supernatural shit that had been raining on her recently, she could still worry about the trivial, day to day things she was used to worrying about.

Noticing her computer in the corner of her eye, she decided to check her email accounts, forums, the google image search, anything that would serve as a distraction from the frustration.

As Kelly waited for the ear piercing shrill of the dial up modem to end, she noticed the drawer where she had stashed the registration plate. Cautiously, she opened it and felt relieved as she noticed it was still there, undisturbed. Although she knew it was doubtful that anyone would stumble across it, she still made a mental note to search for a better hiding place.

Eventually, the room fell silent and the computer displayed a message informing her that she was online. She checked her first email account and found two spam messages, one informing her that her that her computer clock may be incorrect. The second was another of the tiresome get rich quick messages that she seemed to receive every other hour from people who seemed intent of parting her from what little money she had.

She then proceeded to her second account, this was a lesser known email provider and was not as likely to be cursed with junk emails, however it did have twice as many pop ups then most other websites which was almost as bad.

There was new email in her inbox, this was surprising considering the rarity with which she received emails in this account. Kelly clicked the 'inbox' link, read the subject and almost froze with fear. After roughly five minutes of staring at the subject, she clicked the link.

To: Good guess. Not a ghost.

Twenty seven days, thirteen hours, twenty four minutes, three seconds. That is when the world will end.

It's not night yet. Get plenty of rest.

The message also included an attachment. It was a text file with the title 'you'll need this.'

Kelly stared at the screen for a few more minutes, frightened to even move, some irrational, seemingly primal part of her brain forced her to stay still, that movement might attract the attention of the beast, whatever it was, that was now sending her emails.

Eventually, she moved the cursor over the scan and download option. The file wasn't too large and downloaded after only four seconds. After it had downloaded, she moved the mouse over the 'open' icon.

The computer started to click and whir as the file opened. Cautiously, Kelly moved her eyes over the first page.

The title was the first thing that she saw. Sticking out in larger font then the rest of the document read the words 'The Philosophy of Time Travel by Roberta Sparrow'.

**To be continued,**

**A bit of a short chapter I know, I need to end it where it is though.**


	12. Demon

**Sorry for the wait and thanks again to all reviewers. Just so you know this next chapter may be considered indirectly offensive by some Christians, if that's the case then I apologise to whoever I've offended.**

**Chapter 11: Demon**

'_It was the name of my father, and his father before me_' – Frank

_It wouldn't be long now, the angel had said this and he did not for one second doubt the word of a messenger of God._

_There was no fear, at least not nearly as much as he expected to feel. That was surprising, he was minutes, seconds maybe away from his death, a suicide no less. A death that was condemned._

_'It is not suicide', the words of the angel, his guide for the last month, the being that had kept his sanity intact long enough to fulfil the task God had appointed him with, replayed in his mind. 'You will die serving your Lord God, and your blameless soul shall ascend to his kingdom. Sometimes duty to the Lord means the sacrifice of your own life. You should already know that, think upon the Lord Jesus Christ, the sacrifice he made to save humanity, the sacrifice you make shall do so again.'_

_Despite all he had been taught by the angel, these words still felt like blasphemy in his ears. Throughout his life he had always been taught and had believed with no shadow of doubt that there was and would only ever be one messiah, and it certainly was not him!_

_Or was it?_

_When the angel had first appeared to him, and told him what it was he must do, h thought it to be an evil spirit in disguise, come to set him on the path of destruction and lead him to the doorstep of the devil._

_But when the angel showed him heaven one night in a dream, when he felt the indescribable good and happiness that it seemed to cast in all directions, he knew that it couldn't be an evil spirit talking to him._

_And yet, the things he said. Contradicting commandments and teachings written down by the apostles and disciples from the time of Jesus Christ himself. How can it be that the scripture, that which decent God faring people are taught to live by and uphold, was cast aside by one of the highest of God's servants?_

_He didn't understand it, but he felt, he knew that the angel was right._

_The townspeople didn't see it that way. For weeks he had kept the secret to himself, speaking in hushed whispers whenever the angel was near, never revealing the wondrous and sometimes horrifying things shown to him in his dreams, never revealing God's gifts to others, until the fire started._

_The fire had arrived not two days ago but to him it felt like a lifetime. Old man Cromwell was careless with his cooking pot and burned his house to ashes, the fire ad spread over the thatched roofs, burning and destroying everything it touched._

_He couldn't let the homes and lives of so many be destroyed, not when he knew he could stop it._

_Along with tasks, the angel had given him wondrous gifts, and taught him to use them. With a single thought, he had force the fires to die down until they were nothing but memories._

_The townspeople had seen this good deed of his, and had come to the conclusion that he himself would have come to be it not for the angel, that the man who had saved the town, was a witch, a servant of Satan come to bring chaos and ruin to the world._

_Even his own father, a man whom he had always looked up to, a man who he had thought to have such decency and wisdom within him, a man whose name he was proud to have as his own as a testament to his father's righteousness, and the righteousness of his father and many generations before him, had hunted him down like a wolf._

_Tears began to well up behind his eyes and he pushed them away. It didn't matte anymore, he had escaped, thanks largely to another gift of the angel. He had taken the sword from his room and he had ran from the angered crowds to where he had found it before when he had been tasked with collecting firewood for the house. The time had come at last._

_Once he had the sword where he needed it, he remembered the angel's teachings and opened the portal that would send the weapon through time to where it would, somehow, save the Earth from darkness._

_Then he had jumped through after it. Just as he had been commanded to do._

_He slept then, he was not sure for how long he slept but it felt blissful. There were no demons to taunt his dreams, no memories of loss or sorrow. There was only peace, and a welcoming light._

_When he woke the angel appeared to him one more time, he looked almost relieved. He felt the same way, the clouds that had look like darkness itself leaking into the sky, things which could only be the work of the devil, had now vanished, and were replaced by a glorious star filled night sky._

"_Its almost over." The angel said with a smile, "God and heaven await you."_

_Now, as he stood upon the hill to complete his task, he looked up at that night sky, the same one he vaguely remembered before he fell upon the sword, his own sword, with which he had trained with for months in order to become a knight of St. John. God it seemed had a higher purpose planned for it, and him._

_The sky cracked open without sound. Light shone down upon him, and looking up, he saw his future selves' work. A portion of his mind again momentarily tried to decipher the riddles of 'time travel' for what must have been the hundredth time, the magic of it made no sense to him, but he didn't need to know it now._

_The sword fell from the sky and fell straight through his skull. He died instantly._

"But you didn't go to heaven?" Donnie asked, remembering the watery domain that was now his home, and how he would gladly describe it as anything but heaven. "It was all a ruse to get you to die just before the tangent universe vanished, so you'd become…" Donnie cut himself off and gestured at the demon bunny masked laid carefully on a nearby table.

Frank just nodded, almost mournfully.

"Good, evil, truth, lies, religion," he said in a quiet voice, "They are the tools, not the tasks. The end is salvation."

Donnie simply stared at Frank, confused more then anything else. The person in the story that Frank had just shown him in the same, quasi-movie screen format that Gretchen had used once before looked nothing like the ear ring wearing, clean shaven bunny suited man next to him.

Furthermore, this story seemed to contradict what he had learned. Frank was his name, and presumably his fathers, but was 'Frank' even a name in the middle ages or whatever seemingly ancient time period he had just seen?

_Good, evil, truth, lies, religion._

_Lies._

_Was it a lie? It could be real, couldn't it?_

_Was that the point?_

And in that instant it all seemed clear. As did the term 'manipulated dead'.

It had done what it needed to do, it had shown Donnie what he needed to become if he would be any use in keeping the primary universe intact.

Whether he could become that or not was another matter.

**To be continued.**

**P.S I'm not sure if St. John actually had any knights, that's a vague guess from a computer game. In retrospect maybe i should have left that bit out. Oh well, guess it doesn't much matter.**

**Right, as promised, here are reviews.**

**TheAstoundingCopperPanther: Hmmm,I thinkyour new display name's better . Anyway, glad you're enjoying thus far, era's are kind of interchangable in this story as this chapter, (if i've done it right) shows. Thanks for reviewing.**

**MarkTurner: Thanks, i hope i can keep the chapters as mysterious and not degenerate to inplausible and confusing, oh well, thanks for reviewing.**

**E.P.O: Thanks, its quite tricky to write someof the time travel/paranormal thingswithout them sounding stupid or implausible, and unfortunatly, (as you'll see from later chapters), the most difficult stuff is yet to come. Oh well, thanks for reviewing.**


	13. Sunday

**I'm sorry it's been about half a year since my last update. I have a number of excuses, many of which are shite, apart from one which I doubt you'd believe. The truth for the most part is that I'd lost inspiration for this fic and eventually it drifted into the mists.**

**Anyway, thanks to everyone who's read and reviewed. I'll make sureI update sooner in the future.**

**Anyway, enough of this.**

**Chapter 13: Sunday**

_Grandma Death wrote a book - _Donnie.

Kelly woke suddenly as her alarm clock, which she had forgotten to switch off after she returned home the day before, began to shriek.

As she reluctantly moved herself to get out of bed, Kelly was stopped by a sharp pain in her upper legs, and then another in her back. Sleeping on a park bench for roughly an hour had done her body no favours; and the effects of doing so had now come to haunt her.

The pain helped to jostle Kelly further from her sleep, and forcing herself to move despite the pain, she made her way to the far side of her room, switched off her alarm clock, and promptly returned to her warm bed.

As a rule, Kelly always overslept on Sundays. During weekdays, school forced her out of bed at unearthly and unfair hours, and on Saturdays she normally met up with friends in the town which demanded she get up early. It seemed only fitting to have one day in which she could satisfy her lethargic desires.

Unfortunately, this was not to be the case this Sunday.

_That is when the world will end._

With the memory came all the terror she'd felt after she'd first read those words on the email that the beast had sent her. At the time, all she had been able to do was turn off the computer and lay on the bed until her fear gave way to exhaustion. It had taken a while, despite how tired she was. It took almost an hour for her to stop shaking.

Ordinarily, she'd dismiss emails predicting the end of the world as a joke, a pitiful attempt by someone to scare the feeble minded. She'd heard of and lived through a number of doomsday prophecies in her time, and had come to dismiss them all as laughable.

However, seeing as the messenger this time had the ability to appear and disappear as he pleased, erect invisible force fields and do God only knows what else, the message seemed a lot more believable.

The worst thing was, the message didn't say, 'this is when the world will end unless you do such and such', it said that the world would end. No ifs, no buts, no loopholes.

_You don't know that,_ she told herself. _You don't know what's going on. This could be anything._

_Yeah right._

For a while, Kelly just lay there. The bed had abruptly stopped feeling comfortable. It took Kelly a few moments to realise that this was because she was still dressed. Distantly, she remembered simply crawling onto it the previous night, being too scared and too weary to do anything else.

Kelly pulled the cover away and pushed herself to her feet.

_What the fuck is going on?_

Angrily, she threw a fist into the nearest wall. The result was that the wall remained undamaged and her fingers hurt. There was something oddly comforting about the pain.

She didn't deserve this. She deserved to live the mundane, ordinary life that she was used to. She didn't deserve to have the apocalypse thrown at her. If that was what it was.

_It can't be._

_Can it?_

Either way, for now the world was still here, and she would be damned if she was going to waste any more time feeling terrified that something was going to leap out at her.

Kelly made her way to her wardrobe, pulled out some fresh clothing and made her way to the bathroom.

An hour later, Kelly had dealt with the morning's necessities, (which on a Sunday should rightfully be the early afternoon's necessities), and made her way back to the computer. She wanted another look at that email, maybe she'd missed something.

When she had entered her email address and password, she found to her surprise that another email had been sent to her during the night. A fresh twinge of nervousness accompanied this discovery. Kelly pushed it aside as best as she could and opened her inbox.

As it turns out the email was an offer from someone calling themself 'A. Weasel' for discount Viagra.

Kelly laughed at this momentary distraction from the potential crisis she faced. It was the strange to think of junk mail as welcoming. Then again, these were strange times.

Her mind soon returned to her task. She saw the email on the screen. It sat looking nondescript and unassuming beneath the one she'd just received. For a moment, the cursor simply hung above it. Despite the fact that Kelly had seen it already, a part of her still felt reluctant to touch it. It almost reminded her of a jack-in-the-box that had once frightened her as a child. She was afraid to think what would leap out at her if she opened it.

Taking a deep breath, Kelly clicked the message, and quickly glanced around the room, making sure that her demonic rabbit stalker hadn't returned.

The room was empty.

Kelly re-read the lines of text, and then re-read them again. They still read the same. The message was still that the world would end in just under a month.

And at the end of that, an attached text document.

Kelly uttered a curse under her breath. How could she have forgotten this?

Her mind began to formulate reasons why her forgetting wouldn't be unreasonable considering the circumstances, but Kelly brushed the thoughts aside. Searching her documents folder, she soon found the document that she had been sent.

She remembered seeing it last night. After reading the title she'd instantly closed it and backed away from the computer. Coupled with everything else that had happened, the document had seemed as terrifying as the rest of it.

Now, rested, fed, angered, and within the daylight hours, Kelly was not nearly as afraid as she had been. She began to read the lines of text on her screen.

* * *

Seachnall was awakened abruptly by the high pitched shrill of his phone. He groaned loudly as his mind awakened and he remembered that a huge history essay which was due in the next day awaited him. 

After a few more rings, Seachnall realised that he couldn't avoid the annoying ringing contraption any longer. Extending one weary arm, he plucked the phone from the table, pushed the call button and moved it to his ear.

"Hello?" He said wearily.

"Hi," Kelly responded, "listen, I…"

"Kel?" Seachnall responded with genuine surprise in his voice, "I can't believe you're calling me this early? Do you know what day it is?"

"Seachnall, just listen." The urgency in Kelly's voice, coupled with the fact that she had not called him Sneezer was unusual, and somewhat alarming. Seachnall sat up and listened with more focus.

"I've, I think I've." Kelly paused and pushed out a long breath, "I think I know what all this is about. You need to get over here."

"Kel," murmured Seachnall wearily, "I'm as eager to sort all this out as you are, but this isn't a good day. I've got an essay to finish for Chemistry that I still don't understand, there are…"

"Seachnall, I need you to get over here. You know I wouldn't ask if it wasn't important."

_Yes she would, _Seachnall thought distantly, but decided not to make an issue of it.

"Please." Kelly added. A note of desperation in her voice.

"Alright." Seachnall said at last. "I'll be there in a few hours."

**To be continued. (If the next chapter isn't up sooner then this one was thenyou can all pull out my teeth.)**


	14. Pain

**I can only apologise for yet another colossal void between chapters. The truth is I've been suffering from a colossal lack of both inspiration and ideas for this story. A level exams and enough essays to cause a nervous breakdown didn't help either. Thanks to the reviews for last chapter however I finally pulled my head out of my arse and got down to writing. I've finally managed to come up with some new ideas so hopefully things should be back on the metaphorical track.**

**Thanks to all reviewers, both for reading and dragging me back to the dusty writer's desk. I'll sort out some proper replies in the next chapter which I've already started. (The reason being I can't get to the internet at the moment and can't remember what most people have said, also I think I've delayed this update long enough).**

**Chapter 14: Pain**

'No one knows how or why a living receiver will be chosen' – _From The Philosophy of Time Travel by Roberta Sparrow._

"That's ridiculous."

"Is it? I mean after what we've seen the last…"

"No. Half a registration plate is one thing, but the world doesn't just end like that." Seachnall snapped his fingers and moved his eyes back to the screen in search of some piece of information that he may have missed. "It doesn't just end because some – ghost says it will."

"He's not a ghost."

"You what?"

"He isn't a ghost, he…" Kelly trailed off, unsure of how to sufficiently articulate this point.

"Then what is he?"

"I don't know."

A moment of silence followed. Seachnall sat on the end of Kelly's bed and tried to come up with a new and relevant and above all helpful point that he could follow. None sprung to mind however. This whole thing, whatever it was, had just become far bigger then he had expected. So far, only three options as to what could be happening had occurred to him.

The first idea was that someone, through a series of highly improbable and extremely elaborate deceptions had fooled Kelly into thinking that Armageddon was looming.

The second option that through a series of improbable and extremely elaborate deceptions, Kelly was trying to fool him into thinking that Armageddon was looming. That was perhaps the most likely option, but he couldn't believe it. This wasn't the kind of thing that Kelly did, and it didn't take a genius to recognise that she was genuinely scared.

The third option was that a hitherto unknown supernatural being that had taken on the guise of a demonic bunny had appeared to Kelly and prophesised the end of days. This too seemed somewhat unlikely. So what the hell was going on?

"Can you email a copy of that thing to me. It'll probably help if I can come back to it later."

Kelly didn't respond, she simply stared blankly at the computer screen.

"Kel?"

"What?" She asked suddenly, "Oh sorry, sure I'll send it later."

"Right."

"Listen, there's more to it all this then just the end of the world. I'm not sure I understand all this yet but I think there's a way to prevent it."

"I'm all ears." Said Seachnall, sounding much calmer then he was beginning to feel.

_A way around it?_ Thought Donnie, standing in the far corner of Kelly's bedroom, unbeknownst to either her or Seachnall. _Sure_, _I guess that's one way of putting it._

Considering the fact that Donnie's 'way around it' had been a less then pleasant experience in more ways and one, and an experience which wasn't entirely over yet, it annoyed him to hear it trivialised.

His anger ebbed somewhat when he realised that Seachnall and Kelly's experience wasn't going to be any less unpleasant. He still wasn't sure if they were going to be able to escape it.

He moved his head closer to the computer screen and again felt a strange sense of admiration for the machine. This year he now found himself in was roughly two decades after his death. It was weird. Sometimes it looked just the same as his home decade had, other times it seemed infinitely different. Everything seemed faster, and everything seemed duller somehow. There wasn't as much colour in the world now.

Computers, though not unheard of in his time were certainly something he had never seen or laid his fingers on. They were however certainly not this small of fast, not were they as readily available. The information and power that this small contraption granted to Kelly and God knows how many others was almost unfathomable. It also made life easier for Frank, which he guessed was a good thing. Not that that made him feel any better about it.

"So let me see if I understand this," Seachnall was making a conscious effort not to sound scathing but there seemed no way around it, "We have to take this crispy registration plate back in time which will collapse a 'tangent universe' or a black hole or something which will otherwise erase all traces of creation."

"That's what it says."

"Why doesn't this rabbit man just do it himself?"

"Well that would be too easy wouldn't it? God forbid anything like this should ever be easy."

Another moment of silence followed. Whereas they had both expected some dull, sensible conclusion to the mystery of the registration plate, all traces of sense had seemingly abandoned them. And the only conclusion that seemed to present itself was eschaton. Now, Seachnall's instincts for reasons known only to themselves were urging him to turn away. The 'bury your head in the sand and hope for the best' mentality seemed the most appealing right now, but one way or the other it was the wrong thing to do.

"Right," he said finally, "I don't suppose you know how to travel back in time do you?"

"What do you think?" Kelly snapped in response. Seachnall was taken aback by this uncharacteristic and spontaneous anger.

"Hey I'm trying to help here."

"Yeah," The anger had vanished from her voice and now she just felt tired, "I'm sorry, I just…" She finished her sentence by way of a lazy gesture at the screen.

"Don't need this?" Seachnall volunteered, pointing the screen himself.

"Yeah."

"She looks tired."

Donnie jumped at the sound of Gretchen's voice and turned to find that she had quite literally appeared out of nowhere behind him. He gave a brief hint of a smile and nodded by way of greeting.

"How're they doing?"

"They're dying."

Gretchen stared for a moment at the two kids looking intently at the words of Roberta Sparrow for any clues as to what they could do next. Then she moved towards Donnie and placed a hand lightly on his shoulder.

"This isn't anything that we haven't seen," She said, "Hell we went through this remember? Death's just – well, it won't last."

"But –" Donnie broke off and tried to beat down an all too familiar frustration, "Even if they both go back to before it all happened, it won't be the same for them. All this isn't ever going to leave them alone. They can't be who they are. They can't have the lives they deserve. Frank's stolen that from them."

"If he doesn't –"

"I _know!_" Donnie slumped down into the corner and drove his fists into his knees. "I know, but why does it have to be like this? Why does he have to pluck more people out of the world to do his job for him? Why can't it be him, or hell even us that takes care of this sort of stuff?"

It was Frank that responded. He sounded quite sympathetic considering he'd just been insulted.

"Would you go back if you could?" He asked, his voice an ethereal whisper in the room.

It was a long while before Donnie finally answered.

"No."

"You see yourself as suited for this, maybe deserving of this new state. You wanted this. But that doesn't matter. You were chosen because you could do what was needed."

"Why is this necessary?" Donnie half shouted to the ceiling, "Why can't we take care of these fucking artefacts?"

There was a pause before Frank answered.

"Creation isn't governed by your sense of morality. Neither am I."

A piercing white light sprung into being where Kelly's mirror stood. Soon the reflection of Kelly's bedroom gave way to a portal to a darkened alley in an unknown city. The noise of sporadic passing cars sounded through it."

"Its time you let go of your morality Donnie."

He could do nothing but stare at the portal for a few moments, wondering what exactly Frank meant by all this, and not much liking the ideas that suggested themselves. He turned to face Gretchen who nodded and kissed him briefly before stepping back out of the way.

Donnie stood, and after a few more moments stepped through the portal.

**To be continued**


	15. Providence

**Hmmm, took longer to finish this one then I'd hoped, the reason being no less then five university essays. Anyway, sorry for the wait and thanks to all readers and to The Astounding Copper Panther for reviewing. Replies are at the end.**

**Just two things, I'm going to make most chapters longer from now on. This one should be roughly twice as long as normal. Secondly, this chapter's a bit more unpleasant then most and may not be for the faint of heart.**

**Chapter 15: Providence**

_Burn it to the Ground _- Frank

Donnie's watch, which had conveniently taken to changing itself with the transition from one time zone to another showed the time as 00:34AM. Cars were still whizzing in either direction and the sound of music was coming from at least four unpretentious looking clubs. There were small groups of people dotted about the street who were parting with assorted words and drunken giggles. Two uniformed police officers were standing in front of a spindly man who seemed to be resisting the urge to break into a sprint.

He didn't recognise the town, nor the time. Everything had that same similar yet different quality that he'd been dealing with since he arrived in the future. It smelt different as well, though that was probably the fault of someone's discarded meal on the floor. It was hard to tell whether it was actually food or vomit.

There was something about it that he liked. It could be pretty if you didn't look too closely, a bright, shiny façade covering – something. Given more time and a lack of anything better to do, Donnie could spend hours following his train of thought and any that branched off of it, ending as always in the same unanswerable questions.

But he didn't have time for that now. He still wasn't certain why.

The choice of what to do now was apparently up to him. The street he was on stretched in either direction towards rows of dimly lit areas of buildings which looked either empty or abandoned. In all four of the clubs, lines of half drunk men and women, (women clad in clothes that looked more like a series of tight fitting facecloths, something that must have been uncomfortable in the freezing weather.)

Donnie made his way across the road, heedless of the unending string of cars that passed through him as he walked. He was walking to a seemingly popular club which didn't appear to have a name. Or at least not one that was made obvious to passers by. There was something about that as well which he liked.

As he stepped past the bouncer who was looking with unfriendly eyes upon a group of kids who looked about fourteen and were claiming with a passion that they'd left their ID at home. Donnie couldn't help but smirk. How they could have ever have hoped to talk their way past any halfway decent bouncer was something of an enigma.

He put the thought aside as the sound of a song he didn't recognise jumped to an almost deafening volume. After he'd walked past the cloakroom, he found himself in a cavernous hall with about half a dozen spotlights flicking from atop the head of one dancing patron to another.

In the distance there were about twenty people all screaming at two bartenders who were making a valiant effort to dispense drinks quickly. Distantly, Donnie remembered that it had been a while since he'd emptied a beer can. Granted anything he ate and drank in his new form as a wraith or whatever he was now dripped or tumbled out of the hole in his stomach less then five seconds after he swallowed it. Also he didn't know if he could still get drunk, and even if he could that probably wasn't a wise idea right now, for one thing the sight of beer leaking from an invisible guy's gut might raise an eyebrow or two. Then again, that wasn't his problem. And his throat, somehow, was a bit on the dry side.

No sooner had he made this decision then Donnie found a pair of arms belonging to an obviously wasted Blonde girl draped around his suddenly corporeal neck. For a moment it was all he could do to gawk in surprise at this revelation. His mouth formed a slack jawed expression which sent the sloped figure in front of him into a slurred laugh.

As she laughed, her head drooped to and her grasp on Donnie waned somewhat. She began to fall to her knees. Instinctively, Donnie's own arms shot out in and closed around the girl's shoulders in an attempt to catch her before she fell, leaving her dangling awkwardly in mid decent at an awkward angle. A few people were beginning to stare at this unusual show unfolding before them.

Donnie's salvation came in the form of a strangely familiar looking man who appeared behind the girl and virtually ripped her off of him.

"Sorry about that." The newcomer shouted over the sound of 'Iron Man' which was now playing, "Dumb bitch'll cling onto anything with a prick."

With a muffled expletive that Donnie didn't catch and an unfriendly glare at the girl who was now making a fighting effort to keep her head rested on his shoulder shoulder, the man began to move to the exit with the girl stumbling in tow.

Donnie stared at the retreating figures for as long as they were within sight, searching for any faces in his memory which might explain why that guy looked so familiar. In the end though he came up empty and soon decided that it didn't much matter at the moment.

"You want to spare the innocent from harsh realities?" Whispered Frank in Donnie's ear, the noise of the club conveniently vanishing at the same time, "Now's your chance. Kill him."

"What?"

"Did you think I bought you hear to get drunk?" Frank said in the same haunting monotone voice he always used, "Kill him, before it's too late." With that, the music and assorted sounds of the crowd returned. Leaving Donnie alone, once more ethereal he discovered as someone vomited the contents of their stomach straight through him, causing a string of outraged complaints from the living patrons standing in the way.

Who did he have to kill? Well, that part was simple. He had to kill the guy whose face he vaguely recognised. He knew that beyond any doubt. Frank had instilled a certainty in him to ensure against any confusion. The obvious and difficult question was why did he have to kill him? And what would happen if he was 'too late'.

A number of unpleasant theories presented themselves, and though none came even close to putting Donnie in a murderous mood, he decided to track down the man anyway. If something happened, he could intervene without killing anyone. Right?

He hastily made his way through the nearest wall and found himself back on the freezing street. It was marginally less crowded now. The drunken shivering lines had all but dispersed and the seemingly incessant lines of traffic seemed to have broken up somewhat for the moment.

Donnie knew exactly where the man was thanks to Frank's silent distribution of information. He was in a black ford mondeo which was moments away from leaving a nearby car park opposite a disused library. Having not known anything about this town only minutes ago, Donnie now felt almost like a native as he hurriedly traversed a shortcut in the form of an alleyway.

He spotted the car almost instantly. It was one of only three in the car park and the only one which had anyone in it. The blonde girl was now passed out in the back seat, her head leaning against the car window in a doubtlessly uncomfortable pose that she seemed utterly unaware of.

Breaking into a sprint, Donnie cleared the remaining distance between himself and the car and hurriedly sat himself in the passenger's seat before the man, _he still couldn't figure out why he looked so familiar, _accelerated into the distance.

When Donnie sat down he realised that his travelling companion/apparent murder victim seemed nervous about something. His mouth was fluctuating continually between a worried grimace and an angry snarl. His head was flicking over his shoulder incessantly. Donnie's suspicions escalated no end. However he still couldn't be sure, and he couldn't kill someone if he wasn't sure if- and anyway. Even if it was what he thought it was, there had to be another way.

Ten minutes later and Donnie was still in the passenger's seat. Still watching as the driver gradually became calmer. He even caught an occasional hint of an unpleasant grimace on the man's face as the city lights began to give way to a darkened and largely empty freeway.

He was sure now. This guy would take the drugged girl back to some secluded house where he would rape her, and they'd probably find her stab wound riddled corpse in a ditch about twenty miles out of town in a month or two. There was no doubt anymore. If the looks on the guy's face weren't enough, a silent nod of confirmation from Frank who was sitting on the hood made for a pretty convincing argument. Certainty and a resulting action though weren't as easy to combine as one might expect.

The problem was ultimately solved by Frank who, with a grin of what could almost be described as pride, reached through the windshield, grabbed Donnie's arms and flung him onto the road like a discarded coat.

This sight, or at least some of it had not gone unnoticed by the driver. With a strangled cry of horror he slammed his foot down on the breaks and pulled hard on the steering wheel, trying desperately to avoid this guy who'd just appeared out of nowhere.

The car broke into a spin and passed straight through Donnie, it managed to stay on the road however, after a moment of listening to the ear piercing screech of the breaks and watching smoke emerge from under the tyres, Donnie saw the door on the driver's side of the car open. The figure that stepped out was a different one to the one he'd seen earlier. But now Donnie had a pretty good idea of where he'd seen the guy before.

_Hey you fuck!_

He was wearing a Middlesex high school uniform of all things. His face was the same intimidating mesh of stubble and overly gelled hair that Donnie remembered. He couldn't help but feel a twinge of instinctive intimidation.

_I've got a bigger knife._

He seemed apparently unaware of his recent change in shape and clothes however. He also didn't seem to recognise this mystery person.

"What the hell are you doing in the road arsehole?"

Donnie stayed silent; an almost involuntary grin appeared on his face. He was almost tempted to laugh at the strange and almost nonsensical feeling of triumph in his gut.

"What are you doing with her?" Donnie asked coolly, the tone of his voice sounded a bit like Franks.

A nervous twitch was his answer. As well as:

"Mind your own fucking business." Then after a deep breath, "Where the hell did you come from?"

Without waiting for an answer, the man, or at least the teenage thug he'd turned into looked around nervously for any signs of life other then this mystery guy who'd he'd just swerved to avoid, (he somehow looked strangely familiar). There was no one else around however. With a nervous, stuttered laugh and a clumsy motion, he pulled a sizable looking knife from a pocket in his trousers.

"You should have stayed the hell away from me." He half shouted as he moved towards his target.

Donnie remained motionless. The smirk was still on his face, any feelings of reluctance were now giving was to a single minded certainty that neither the world, nor himself would suffer without this guy in it.

The first swing moved gracefully to the side of Donnie's neck and made a sound like metal hitting stone. He needed to be corporeal to deal with this fucker, but barriers could help him avoid and undue complications.

He launched a fist which caught the surprised high school student in the side of the head. The force of the blow was stronger then anything that Donnie could have pulled off during his previous life, and the guy wasn't likely to be getting up anytime soon.

The knife fell to the floor by Donnie's right foot. Kneeling down, Donnie scooped it up almost distantly. It seemed to fit in his hand like it was designed for such a place.

His victim was unconscious on the floor. With a grin and a sick sense of satisfaction that Donnie wasn't entirely convinced was his own, (or entirely his own), he moved over the unconscious form and struck downwards with the knife.

**To be continued **

**Right, now for some long overdue replies.**

**TheAstoundingCopperPanther: Glad to see you're willing to overlook colossal spaces of time between updates. Thanks for the review, glad to see that the story's still on form after the many months of nothingness.**

**Aiden Burn: It wasn't a bad review really, over use of commas and so forth is stuff I'd probably do well to avoid, in any case, thanks for your review and comments.**

**Elliot Bowers: Your considerable devotion to the rules of grammar is all well and good, and some of your advice I think I'll do well to take onboard. Overuse of commas for example. However things like one sentence paragraphs suit my purpose in that they emphasise the point or halfway witty line that I'm using. Anyhoo, thanks for your in depth and well rounded comments.**

**Sharah: I'm glad you enjoyed it. Again, sorry its taken me so long to continue with the thing. I'm glad to see that the characters in the story resemble the characters in the movie. Although that may change after this chapter. Anyway, thanks for reviewing.**

**Wayward Childe: Ah come on, its not that good. (I have to make some show of modesty), seriously though. Thanks for your review.**

**Since I can't really say much to anyone else apart from thanks for reviewing and sorry for the wait, I shall extend thanks and again appologise also to blackfphoenix, tzuy, stardust03, mousewolf, Horrorfanatic6990, Joralie and anyone I've overlooked for reviewing. Thanks also to any other reading persons.**


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